Pastor’s Message

NEWS AND UPDATES

I am pleased to announce that we have received five (5) proposals for the school and convent properties! The next phase of the process is to communicate with the prospective organizations by submitting questions for clarification and vice-versa. The St. James Campus Redevelopment
Committee and I will be meeting this week to discuss the project. My goal is to schedule a parish townhall meeting within the next eight weeks to outline the proposed direction for the parish redevelopment.

These are exciting times as we continue to take positive steps towards an even brighter and more prosperous future for our parish community.

REFLECTION ON THE READINGS

The child was asked to clean his room before he could go out to play. He replied, “What’s the least I have to do?”

He wondered if making the bed would count, or if the floor had to be clean too. Do his clean clothes need to be put away, or only left in the laundry bin and tucked away in his closet? What about under his bed? Would that be checked, and would it have to be clean?

The frustrated father wondered when the child would want a clean room for his own sake and not simply because the father had asked. Friends, such an attitude on the part of the child is similar to what’s on display in today’s gospel.

To those people who want to be right with God but wonder what the minimum is required to achieve that relationship, Jesus has an answer. Jesus takes certain aspects of the law of Moses and the Ten Commandments and expands them.

Rather than a command not to kill, Jesus says, do not grow angry. Rather than a command not to commit adultery, Jesus says not to look at another person with lust.

In other words, the Mosaic Law and the Ten Commandments are not simply the bare minimum we need to do to be right with God. Instead, we need to go above and beyond the letter of the law if we are to be followers of Christ. Merely fulfilling the minimum is not enough.

When Jesus responds in this way, we may crave a return to the minimum!

So when we want to ask, “What’s the least I have to do as a follower of Christ?” we may need to reconsider the question.

When we desire a relationship with Christ for its own sake, and not simply because we’ve been somehow coerced, a life of faith flows naturally. We no longer count the minimum but instead live in a relationship of trust, fidelity, and love.

Go above and beyond!

Quote of the Week